-preface-

This is the opening of my first novel in progress! I still have a long way to go, and it’s always subject to change, but I don’t think I’ll ever know how much progress I’m really making without a little feedback, so please let me know what you think <3

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The Heavenly Collar pulsed again — slow, deliberate, like a hand tightening around her throat.

Aella didn’t move. She was the Maiden. She was meant to kneel. To still her hands as they lifted in supplication to the Golden One. To empty her mind in reverence.

Her arms ached, her legs long since gone numb — but the pain was distant, almost forgotten. Stillness filled the shrine like breath held too long. Trails of incense drifted upward, coiling toward the painted ceiling in patient spirals. The ritual had begun.

Her body perfectly reflected the same stillness as the towering idol before her — but her mind wandered elsewhere.

She imagined the Hanging Garden, six floors above, where the frost-curled vines of solenroot were due to flower this week. If she weren’t locked in silence, she might have slipped out to watch them bloom as the first snow fell on the mountainside — just to see if the herbalist’s theory was right about cold-reactive blossoms.

Or maybe she’d sneak into the laundry vault again and dig through the discarded silks and linens, the ones too threadbare or torn to be missed. She’d been working on a new flicker talisman — small, contained, not strong enough to be useful to anyone but her.

She held motionless — solid as white marble. But in her mind she paced relentlessly, counting down the minutes.

Footsteps, soft as rain on silk, marked the Silent Maid’s arrival. Aella didn’t lift her head, but she heard the shift of cloth, the careful placement of feet — and then the quiet clink of the gilded bowl being set beside her.

She could smell it: jasmine, soft and sharp, cut with the earthy bitterness of duskvine root.

Finally, she lowered her arms and folded her hands in her lap — left over right, palms up. Blood rushed back through her limbs, tingling and aching.

The young girl moved with practiced reverence, kneeling at Aella’s side. She dipped the cloth, fingers steady, and lifted it toward Aella’s exposed collar.

_Cold_.

The fabric touched her skin and the Collar tightened again, as if it resented even the ritual meant to cleanse it. It wasn’t supposed to respond to proximity — only to resistance — but lately, it had been growing more sensitive.

As if it could _feel_ something changing.

Aella counted backward. Five, four, three. The pain dulled, but didn’t leave.

The Maid’s brow pinched, ever so slightly. She never spoke — _couldn’t_ — but Aella had come to read the smallest changes in her face. A furrow here. A softened gaze there.

The girl adjusted the cloth to avoid the Voidstones, though they still glimmered faintly beneath the skin. Aella inhaled through her nose and held it, waiting for the burn to pass.

When it did, she let herself shift her eyes — not toward the idol before her, but toward the smoke curling above the brazier.

The incense still burned. The ritual continued. The silence stretched on.

———

The Maid had just finished adjusting the veil over Aella’s dark hair when the shrine door opened with a hiss of lacquered wood and cold air.

The scent of pine and the brittle breath of winter swept in.

High Priestess Heranna stepped into the shrine without waiting for acknowledgment. She didn’t need to. The black of her robes cut starkly against the light marble. Her face, as always, was unreadable — carved in the same solemn style as the statues that lined the outer halls.

“Leave us.”

The command cut across the stillness. The Maid bowed low — much lower than Aella ever did — and withdrew, quiet as breath. As soon as the door closed behind her, the temperature seemed to drop.

Aella remained kneeling, spine straight, veil lowered over her simmering golden gaze. She knew better than to speak first. She also knew it didn’t matter. Her silence would be interpreted either as humility or defiance, depending on the High Priestess’s mood.

“You were late to posture three,” Heranna said at last, circling the prayer ring with slow, deliberate steps. “Is that so difficult for you still, after fourteen years of instruction?”

Aella said nothing. Her jaw clenched — not from shame, but from the effort it took to bite back the retort she wanted to give.

A flick of black fabric passed through her peripheral vision as Heranna came to a stop beside her.

“Your mother was like a wild dog. No grace. Too vicious. And your father — well, a heretic’s bastard is no better.” A pause. “Shameful filth.”

The words hurt, as they always did — like jagged, deep thorns. Aella felt the sting in her throat, but swallowed it down. She was used to this. She wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of rising to the bait.

“Yet still,” Heranna murmured, “the Golden One saw fit to place you here. The offspring of a beast and a bastard. Your very blood reeks of the Wastes.” She leaned closer. “You should be grateful for your elevation, girl. We scrubbed you clean, and still you can’t help but track in dirt.”

Aella kept her head bowed, but her thoughts were razor-edged.

_Grateful_.

Her lips twitched. Just a fraction. A single, bitter exhale slipped free. Not quite a laugh. Just a breath that held the shape of one.

The silence that followed thickened. Heranna’s robes rustled with the shift of her weight.

“You find humor in your own unworthiness?”

“I am grateful,” Aella said softly, the veil of deference wrapped neatly around her voice. “To be reminded of my origins. I would hate to forget what a _gift_ the Temple has given me.”

Heranna studied her for a long moment. Then: “Your Ascension is set. One week.”

Aella inclined her head in acknowledgement, though something in her chest dropped like a stone.

“One week,” Heranna repeated, stepping back. Something had shifted in her tone. Quieter now. Emptier.

She left without another word. The door slid shut with finality.

———

When the door opened again, the Maid stepped back in — not quiet this time, but brisk, almost scolding. Her eyes went straight to Aella’s posture: her hands had fallen apart in her lap, her veil had slipped slightly to the side.

Her fingers moved with rapid, precise gestures.

_You were reckless_.

“I know,” Aella muttered. “Not now.”

The Maid frowned. _You mocked her_.

“I didn’t,” she muttered. Then, after a pause: “…Not much.”

The Maid’s brow rose. Aella stared at the incense bowl. Her mouth felt dry. Her heart still hadn’t settled.

The Maid stepped forward and adjusted her veil again, slower this time, more careful. But her brow was still knit, her motions sharper than usual. Aella could read them as clearly as words: _You scared me_.

“I’m sorry,” Aella murmured. “I just…”

She shook her head. “I didn’t think it would be so soon.”

The Maid didn’t reply — not in gesture, not in look. She simply stepped back, then reached for Aella’s arm to help her rise.

Aella stood on her own, if unsteadily. Her legs trembled beneath her as the blood rushed back. Her breath caught.

_Seven days_.

She followed the Maid out of the shrine and into the winter-chilled corridors of the Temple, the ache in her bones only half as sharp as the one behind her ribs.